Tiny Avon’s tax spike is a local outlier

Monday

Feb 5, 2018 at 7:00 AM

The tiny town just north of Brockton saw its residential tax rate jump 7.3 percent this year to $18.55 per $1,000 in assessed property value. The spike stands more than a full percentage point over the region’s next highest, Whitman, which went up by 6.1 percent, and the next closest was Stoughton’s 2.2 percent jump.

Tom Relihan The Enterprise TMRelihan_ENT

AVON – Paul Carrel has lived in Avon his whole life. He built a home and raised a family there. But all the while, he's watched a slow creep of tax increases push his bills higher each year.

When he opened his most recent tax assessment this month, the shock was enough to break the proverbial camel's back. Carrel's tax bill rose from around $6,300 to about $9,400 in just the past three years, including $2,000 between the last two. Coupled with a 15 percent increase in his home’s value after a revaluation, it’s enough to convince him to put his house up for sale this spring.

While nearly all of the region’s towns and cities saw their residential tax rates decrease between this year and last, Avon’s continued along an upward trajectory with the largest increase in the region.

The tiny town just north of Brockton saw its residential tax rate jump 7.3 percent this year to $18.55 per $1,000 in assessed property value. The spike stands more than a full percentage point over the region’s next highest, Whitman, which went up by 6.1 percent. The next closest was Stoughton’s 2.2 percent jump.

The situation has many other residents seeing red over their green. Some reached by The Enterprise declined to discuss it, but posts about it on social media drew hundreds of comments and sparked days of debate.

“I was born and raised here, I built a house here… but it’s just not the same town it used to be,” Carrel said of the increases.

By many measures, Avon is a tax outlier in the Brockton area.

The town’s residential rate is now up more than 16 percent over what it was in 2014, and it has risen consistently year-over-year by an average of about 3.9 percent – again, the most of any other community in the region, according to state data.

This year, the town’s rate is higher than 81 percent of municipalities, statewide. By comparison, Whitman – the town with the next highest tax increase in the area – has a rate higher than about half of the state. Only Holbrook ($20.67/$1,000) and Sharon ($19.37/$1,000) have higher rates than Avon, and both saw a slight decrease this year.

With the average value of a single-family home in Avon sitting at $302,772 this year, a typical homeowner can expected to pay about $5,615 in taxes this year. Assistant Assessor Paul Sullivan said he believes it’s the first time home values have passed the $300,000 mark in town.

The town also has the state’s ninth highest commercial tax rate at $35.06 per $1,000 in assessed value, according to recent data published by the Boston Business Journal. In the South Shore and Brockton area, only Holbrook, with the state’s fourth highest commercial tax rate, beats it.

Milton (up 1.84 percent) and Taunton (up 0.06 percent) were the only other communities in the region to see their rates rise this year. Randolph (down 12.6 percent), Brockton (down 11.4 percent) and Quincy (down 10.2 percent) saw the most substantial reductions.

“A distinct disadvantage”

Town Administrator Frank Crimmins said the increases are a result of Avon’s lower population, its geographically small size – covering an area of just four square-miles – and because it is considered an affluent community. All of those attributes serve to reduce the amount of state aid it can rely on each year, he said.

“We don’t get a lot from Chapter 70 (state aid) reimbursements for schools or Chapter 90 for road work,” Crimmins said. “The funding formulas don’t favor towns with small populations because it’s a per capita formula. When you compare us to some other towns, we’re considered affluent and don’t qualify. We’re not deemed needy for aid. You can’t find a town as small as Avon in this part of the state. We're at a distinct disadvantage.”

He noted the increases are not due to big increases to the town’s operating budget – which is only up about $1 million year-over-year – but instead because voters have consistently supported funding projects to improve the town’s infrastructure, specifically the schools, roads and water system.

“We have a new police station about to break ground, and every one of those projects gets voted on at our annual town meeting,” Crimmins said. “When people in Avon vote for their community and to support projects, they’re making a distinct investment in their community.”

He noted a recent debt exclusion vote to raise the money needed for the police facility passed by a 2-1 ratio, while similar proposals often fail at the ballot box elsewhere. State law limits a community’s property tax rate from rising more than 2.5 percent annually, unless voters approve going higher.

“They knew the need,” he said of the vote.

Sullivan said the town splits its tax rate, with commercial taxpayers paying a higher rate. If that were not the case, he noted, the rate would be closer to $25 per $1,000.

Crimmins said the town also has lower trash, water and sewer rates than other comparable communities. The town’s water is sourced from municipal wells, he noted, and the trash fees are kept down by the town’s use of single-stream recycling, where any trash can be placed in one bin and the recyclables are separated out later.

But Carrel, the longtime resident, said he hasn’t seen the benefits of his ever-higher tax bill.

“We have a Walmart in town. I just can’t understand why the residential rate just keeps going up and up,” he said. “It’s not like we have this brand new high school to pay for. The town is four square miles, and that hasn’t increased. Some houses have been built, but the infrastructure hasn’t changed that much.”